Talked to a retired Leica tech at a swap meet and he changed my mind about cleaning old shutters

I was at a camera swap in Portland last Saturday, and this older guy saw me digging through a box of beat-up rangefinders. He asked what I was doing, I said grabbing cheap bodies to practice CLA work on. He laughed and told me I was probably wrecking them. Said most people scrub old cloth shutters way too hard with alcohol and ruin the sealant on the curtain tracks. He showed me a M3 he fixed with just compressed air and a tiny brush, no chemicals at all. Honestly it made me rethink my whole approach to cleaning. I always figured more cleaning meant better results but he was right, I've seen sticky curtains that probably got messed up from overzealous swabbing. Has anyone else tried going dry on old shutters or am I just overthinking this one?

2 comments

2 Comments

laura_white9914d ago

Oh man, that retired tech story is gold. I had a similar wake-up call last summer when I was trying to clean a beat-up Kodak Retina and ended up making the shutter timing all wonky because I got too aggressive with the lighter fluid. A friend of mine who restores old movie projectors told me the same thing about compressed air and dry brushes being the real secret weapon for delicate mechanisms. He said most of the "gunk" people think is built-up grime is actually just loose dust that a blast of air can fix without touching anything. I think we all come from that place where we figure harsher chemicals equals cleaner results, but it's really about gentle and patient work with the right tools.

brookep2714d ago

Your friend is totally right about the compressed air thing. It’s wild how much of what looks like tough grime just floats away with a good puff. The whole “gentler is better” lesson is one I keep having to relearn the hard way too.